This award is an outcome of the NSF 09-524 program solicitation "George E. Brown, Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES) Research (NEESR)" competition and includes the University of California, San Diego (lead institution), San Diego State University (subaward), and Howard University (subaward). This project will utilize the NEES equipment sites at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Additional core project team members include industry members leading code development activities and researchers at Worcester Polytechnic Institute.

Intellectual Merit: Nonstructural components and systems (NCS) are those elements within a building that do not contribute to the building's load bearing system. NCSs are generally categorized as being either an architectural, mechanical, plumbing, or content item or system of items. Since the 19th century, NCSs have demonstrated their potential to create a dangerous environment for building occupants during earthquake shaking. Since these elements generally represent more than 80% of the total investment of a building, even minor damage can translate to significant financial losses. In fact, over the past three decades, the majority of earthquake-induced direct losses in buildings are directly attributed to NCS damage. Of the handful of full-scale building experiments conducted in the United States, none have specifically focused on evaluating the response of nonstructural component and systems (NCSs) during earthquake shaking. This project involves a landmark test of a full-scale, five-story building completely furnished with NCSs, including a functioning passenger elevator, partition walls, cladding and glazing systems, piping, HVAC, ceiling, sprinklers, and other building contents, as well as passive and active fire systems. The NEES-UCSD and NEES-UCLA equipment combine to realize this unique opportunity and hence advance understanding of the full-scale dynamic response and kinematic interaction of complex structural and nonstructural components and systems. While most NCSs in these experiments will be designed to the latest state of the art building code seismic provisions, non-seismic detailed designs widely used in low-seismic regions of the United States will also be included. Furthermore, this research will investigate the potential for protecting critical NCS systems using, for example, damping and/or isolation methods. Data from these unique experiments will be used to compare earthquake performance predictions determined using available commercial and research computational modeling platforms. Research at the system level that incorporates the structure and the NCSs and addresses issues such as detrimental kinematic and dynamic interaction between systems components is lacking. This research will enable, for the first time, tests of complex systems, which look closely at multidisciplinary issues, using facilities that are fully equipped to investigate, in a controlled environment, the effects of earthquakes on building-NCS system performance.

Broader Impacts: Outcomes from this research will have broad and immediate impacts on the performance-based design of NCSs, including NCS fire protection systems. This research will support doctoral students in the earthquake engineering area and master students in construction management and protective systems areas. The project has developed unique partnerships to attract a diverse student group to earthquake engineering via educational activities that engage faculty and students from Howard University, as well as high school students from the Construction Tech Academy (an engineering and construction magnet program in San Diego). Data from this research will be archived and made available to the public through the NEES data repository.

Project Report

Project Overview This landmark project involved earthquake and post-earthquake live fire testing of a five-story building constructed at full-scale on the NEES@UCSD outdoor shake table. Unique to previous full-scale building test programs, the structure was completely outfitted with nonstructural components and systems (NCSs), including two types of facades, (for the first time) an operable passenger elevator, prefabricated steel stairs, building services such as piping, a heating-ventilation-air conditioning system, operable fire sprinklers and risers, as well as other passive and active fire systems, complete electrical and lighting, partition walls, two floors of medical occupancy, and other necessary equipment and building contents (Fig. 1 and 2). By testing a building complete with NCSs, kinematic interaction amongst the various NCSs and with the building itself could be investigated. Coined the Building Nonstructural Components and Systems (BNCS) project, the project involved government, state, and private funding with resources in excess of $5M. The project involved three physical phases of testing: (i) earthquake shaking while the building was isolated at its base, (ii) earthquake shaking while the building was fixed at its base, and (iii) post-earthquake live fire tests within select earthquake damaged compartments. The seismic test phases occurred in April and May of 2012 and involved imposing a suite of increasing intensity recorded and scaled earthquake motions from a broad array of source events on the test building. Seismic Test Phase Observations The BNCS test structure was subjected to seismic motions well above its design performance, with measured interstory drifts in excess of 6%. Physical damage to the structural system was substantial and included complete fracture of longitudinal reinforcing bars in framing members and development of punching shear mechanisms at interior column-slab interfaces (Fig. 3). Several NCSs in the test program demonstrated quite good performance, attaining design expectations and remaining functional despite the very large demands imposed upon them. These NCSs, which observed mostly minor damage throughout the test program, included the fire sprinkler system, seismically designed ceilings, roof mounted equipment, and restrained contents. In contrast, select NCSs installed in the test building attained unacceptable levels of damage at demand levels lower than design expectations. These components included: (i) the prefabricated metal stairs (Fig 4a), (ii) the façade at the lower floors of the building, which was constructed of cold-formed steel balloon framing overlaid with synthetic stucco (Fig. 4b), and (iii) the medical equipment (Fig. 4c). Key Project Outcomes A wealth of high-resolution data is now available to the community from the more than 500 analog sensors, 80 video cameras, and GPS system utilized to monitor the BNCS test building. The experimental data from these tests are proving invaluable to the earthquake and fire engineering communities, supporting advancement of numerical modeling tools, future design codes (such as ASCE 7-16 and others) and construction practices. A detailed report series as well as a technical conference and journal papers are available summarizing the test program and findings; as well as follow-up analysis, modeling, and other efforts. More details may be found at bncs.ucsd.edu. Project Team and Partnerships The core academic project team was composed of faculty and students at the University of California, San Diego (Hutchinson, Conte and Restrepo), San Diego State University (Walsh), Howard University (Marin), and Worcester Polytechnic Institute (Meacham). Eleven graduate students (seven of these PhD students; including three female students) and eight undergraduates conducted research during this effort. This project also supported payload projects at CalPoly-San Lius Obispo and Worcester Polytechnic Institute; three different Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) programs at San Jose State University, Howard, and UCSD; and six teachers in the broader San Diego school districts via the Research Experience for Teachers (RET) program. The collective support of more than 40 industry sponsors committed to this effort from the onset of design, through construction, testing and post-test data interpretation. Technical oversight to the project was provided by three different committees consisting of experts in design, construction and regulatory practice; university faculty and researchers active in structural, nonstructural, and earthquake research; and material/product suppliers of NCSs. Funding was provided by the NSF-NEESR program, grant number CMMI-0936505. Additional financial support was provided from the Englekirk Advisory Board, the Charles Pankow Foundation, the California Seismic Safety Commission and the industry sponsors. A listing of industry project sponsors may be found on the project website: http://bncs.ucsd.edu/index.html. The technical support of NEES@UCSD and NEES@UCLA staff were essential to the success of this project. Societal Awareness A live NSF webcast was presented during testing, and extensive media coverage nationally and internationally were also important societal impacts of this work. In addition, a unique UCSD-TV documentary video, geared towards public awareness of the vulnerability of hospitals, was developed via support of the California Seismic Safety Commission[1]. [1] http://uctv.tv/shows/Building-it-Better-Earthquake-Resilient-Hospitals-for-the-Future-21399

Project Start
Project End
Budget Start
2009-10-01
Budget End
2014-09-30
Support Year
Fiscal Year
2009
Total Cost
$1,296,250
Indirect Cost
Name
University of California San Diego
Department
Type
DUNS #
City
La Jolla
State
CA
Country
United States
Zip Code
92093